185 replies to this topic

[HowardC]

Hi. I've seldom posted on this forum explicitly because VP was closed-sourced, which meant it took forever for bugs to get fixed and/or new features to be added. On top of that, Randy hasn't really done anything with it since FP came out so it was slow going. Don't misunderstand me, VP is a wonderful program and I'm grateful to get it in any form, but a program that lets other people write simulations and yet is closed-source makes no sense.

Open source changes everything for me. I'm really excited about VP again and what this can bring!


With that being said, I'm a prgrammer, specializing in VB/vbscript and i've dabbled in the mame source on occasion adding minor bug fiexes to the code. Oh I can also program in directX So if there are issues, I can help!

Speaking strictly as a programmer, here's what I'd like to see happen. (And keep in mind I haven't messed with VP in a LOOOONG time so some of this stuff might already be implemented.)

1. Get rid of the expirations, those were annoying for people putting VP in an offline cabinet that might get updated once every few years at best.

2. More robust command-line support. There always seem to be issues with using the "play" command programatically, so just drop it and launch via command-line like mame does.

3. Switch both pinmame and vp over to using mame's new output system and implement a input method using the same system. Since mame accepts all comers at this point (even photo booths are
emulated) The only thing keeping the pinmame roms from being in the official mame is the special input/output communication needed. Mame has evolved to the point that it can pretty much do the things needed for VP communication in the stock build. Merging pinmame with mame would mean less trouble for the pinmame devs as a custom build would no longer need to be maintained and also it would encourage mame devs to do more pinmame tables. It would also mean no more DDE. I like DDE, don't get me wrong, but it can be hard on the system resources.

4. Speaking of mame... regarding the handling of the source code should be done EXACTLY as they do it. Basically you have an email address setup for submissions... all submissions must be made by taking the untouched, latest source and comparing it via a "-diff" generator. This diff file is email to the head honcho and all he has to do to test it is use the diff to patch the official source. If it works then it's included next version.... if not then it's rejected. Then a forum is setup dedicated to nothing but documenting bugs. The system has worked amazingly well for mame, so I don't see any reason to try anything different.

5. Alpha blending...... These "faked" transparent ramps are getting silly. With that being said, I understand EXACTLY why it was disabled. Firstly alpha blending takes a lot of resources, if AB was turned on for every surface on a table it'd slow to a crawl. This can be fixed by only enabling it for specified geometry though. Secondly, and this is one people just can't seem to wrap their head around... alpha blending screws up shadow/light rendering. See directx can only "see" the flat geometry, so if you make a hole in a texture, it still thinks it's solid. That being said, I still think It'd be useful. I've seen you guys do amazing 3d "fakery" with nothing more than some tricky uses of decals, so I have no doubt adding it in would make from some amazing visual improvments.

I hope I don't come off as sounding pushy or demanding, I just figured if Randy's handing the keys over to US, we might as well hit the ground running.

(p.s. Excuse the grammar and spelling... it's 3 am here!)

Edited by HowardC, 11 March 2010 - 08:01 AM.

[hydra]

awesome, got a link to it on sourcforge yet?

[xzotic]

Runs and checks calendar...nope...not April 1st....hmmm.....

FAR CANAL !

[TheMcD]

1. Get rid of the expirations, those were annoying for people putting VP in an offline cabinet that might get updated once every few years at best.

What expirations? VP 9.x and 8.1 are non-expiring - that should be all you need.

The McD

[indigofan]

Well even better would be an open source port to the Mac!

Best news ever! (after the birth of my two children of course).

Thanks Randy for releasing it to the community.

[telengard]

Hats off to Randy for opening up the source! I had hoped for this since quite a while ago, and even privately msg'ed Randy about licensing the source but then got involved w/ Aaron's pinball project when I did not hear back. I also was doing my own for a while, but as mentioned, it is a LOT of work. Just the physics alone were enough for me to give up in frustration. That and trying to handle loading/rendering 3-d models. I had spent weeks and weeks on pretty simple stuff like getting a 3-d flipper to be on the table.

I do still have the code to add python scripting support (bi-directional) to an application which is what I used in my project. This would be a great cross platform way of scripting tables, so a Linux port would be feasible. I'll make what I have available and also am looking forward to contributing to the project! I had also started (but never finished) my attempt at porting PinMame to Linux. I got part way through and the author was helping out a bit, but again, due to time I had to punt.

~telengard

[rockinricky]

This is awesome interesting news. Makes me wish I was good at programming, if I was, I'd make a converter program that would take a VP8 table as input and spit out a VP9 table. Along the lines of VP8 Table --> "Black Box" --> VP9 Table.

[destruk]

If you want to work on VP, register on sourceforge and we can add your permissions to commit files to the SVN. Send me a pm or email with your sourceforge user name - and if the SVN gets sabotaged or ruined by a certain LordNightmare, we have 3 backup svn locations, so that's not an issue either.

[LvR]

Hey, I've missed that one !

It a very good news for the pinball community, thx for releasing sources !

[kruge99]

- and if the SVN gets sabotaged or ruined by a certain LordNightmare, we have 3 backup svn locations, so that's not an issue either.

Is this a joke? What a sick individual... I pity anyone who would do such a thing.

[destruk]

Is this a joke? What a sick individual... I pity anyone who would do such a thing.

No joke. This guy is still hanging around trying to cause trouble. Apparently, because VP's source code is covered by the MAME license he was saying it can't be hosted on sourceforge with some link to some rule he interpreted there. I didn't bother to read much of it, and since Visual PinMAME has been on sourceforge for years with no issues under the same license, I don't think it's anything serious. If anything happens to it though, Maddes has his own SVN, and we have a couple others as backups with the current code on them for both programs. I do find it rather ironic how he has made himself out to be an annoying moronic troublemaker, rather than lifting a finger to do any coding work or offer assistance, but that doesn't really matter anymore.

[Maddes]

Destruk is right, SourceForge (SF) is about open source (lower case) and not only "Open Source" (capitalized) as defined by the Open Source Initiative (OSI).
That's why SF offers to choose "another license" in the project details.
Even if SF would ask us to either go "Open Source the OSI way" or go away, we would be able to setup another SVN repository on some other servers within some days.
This weekend I'm going to do the last clean-up changes on the SVN repository and then we are open for developer applications, just send a PM to me or Destruk.

Edited by Maddes, 12 March 2010 - 05:17 PM.

[Noah Fentz]

Destruk and Maddes, please send me your ideas on setting up a category here to aid in suggestions, comments, wishlists, and bug reports.

I'll happily set something up.

[rob046]

Wow, I am late to this party!
Just thought I'd check in today on the state of VP, wishing I had more time to meddle with some of my table making, or hell just getting to play a few tables.
So I tune in today & I'm seeing stuff I thought I'd never honestly see. It had been a few weeks since I checked in, so I figured I'd just see same ol' same ol', then when I saw this thread, I had to rub my eyes, make sure I was seeing it correctly!
In a list of things that myself (& others) proboably never thought would see happen at one point or another...

VPM was never gonna support gottlieb system1, it happened.
Randy was lost for good, we were gonna be stuck with VP6 forever, Randy returned
I never thought I'd see the day where VP ends up in the hands of somebody who is willing to care for it, like destruk, and we see great updates & many of them, and that happened.
Damn, some people thought VP would be totally extinct by now, dinosaur software, but its still here with lots of excitement.
Never thought I'd see VP go open source (or pinmame for that matter), never even crossed my mind. Just didn't seem like Randy would ever let that happen, so this IS A SHOCKER!
Lastly, I recall people mentioning pinball 2000 in the past & they basically get slapped & told to shut up, & for good reason, as the question was asked often & always with the same answer, NO! Yet, with a linux port...could another impossibility come to life? Pinball 2000 is even more than what it seems, it isn't just some video & pinball, the tech that went into those games is some heavy duty stuff....& to be able to emulate those tables, even if it takes 5 years from now, will be an amazing feat.

So much has happened with this hobby in the past year or two. Now its probably old hat to some people. But anybody like myself who was in the community in like '04, '05, '06...things were so "unchanged" back then. But we were all used to it. & the community was large & very active, some great people, so that was never a problem. But we never had a VP update, & we kept using the same old clunky forums that finally died out last year (though lots of good threads lost), and had to keep dealing with the same limitations. We dreamed of what "could be" with VP if only it were open source or if Randy could come back to us with an update, which took freakin years.
But I must say that table authors found ways to overcome VP's shortcomings. The things that Destruk, Scapino, PD, Eala, & many others were coming up with was just amazing. The community could not have thrived as it did without these creative thinkers & problem solvers.

Not sure why I'm feeling like a nostalgic old man, but whatever, I am.
Just saying, looking at things today, as a guy who joined the VP community 6 years & 2 months ago, I remember I joined right around the time when the 1st shivasite crashed, which was a big deal, tons of hard work lost due to some hacker, the loss of tons of tables, but that showed me right away the commitment of many of the members that showed support & offered help, I even remember helping shiva rebuild the table database. So much has changed since then, for the better I'd say, as this community was due some real good karma cuz its full of real good people, & it looks like our patience has garnered us some pretty neat gifts!

& its good to see a sizeable core of important people are still around now that were around back then, even well before I joined, like back in the early aughts when the coolest new table had the ugly blue background, no side rails, some grey walls, dull grey balls (but at the time I'm sure it was awesome, & how much had changed in those early years just between say '02 and '04...quite a bit I'd say, as table quality took a massive leap). Want to let people know to not take all the stuff that has happened the last couple years for granted, as it doesn't always work this way, but hell let's enjoy this as long as we can. & it seems by the length of this thread that people are rightfully excited & supportive.

As for the OPEN SOURCE.
I feel like I should add my comments on what I'd like to see done, but I'd probably just being saying things that have already been said.
However, I do have 1 concern about VP going open source. & to be honestly I was perfectly happy with destruk as caretaker, and with all the tables I have, just dealing with 2 VP versions (VP8 & 9, and I use VP 6 & 7 for certain tables as well, as some tables simply run best on them) can be a pain in the ass, with VP9 & 8 having different compatibility.
So what I'm saying is that I'd still like to see a team effort on VP. I'd rather not see 10 different codeheads releasing their own versions, & each may have its own nice perks, but how about we take the best of the best & roll it into one or two main VP downloads?

Also, compatibility can continue to be a huge deal. With multiple new versions of VP floating around, this could affect the compatibility of some tables to not play well with certain versions, and we could easily lost track of what table should go with what version.
That is kinda the worst case scenario for me. So hopefully whoever picks up this code can continue to work with the likes of destruk as well, as I would also vote him in as kinda a project manager, would be nice (if he's up for it) for him to be filled on on the goings on with open source VP, try to keep things managed.
I think this can all work out OK though. If we keep seeing progress just along the lines of what destruk has been doing for a while, then we'll be in damn good shape. I'd like to see him kinda keep doing what he's doing, despite the open source thing.

And lets look at pinmame. It went open source, yet it seems well managed, nobody is going crazy with it. & the pinmame team is still together & even just recently put out a new version that I have yet to try out. Basically, I come to the site, there is 1 clear download for pinmame, & that is that. Again, I'd hope VP can kinda stay that way, especailly for the sake of noobs that sometimes have a hard enough time as it is getting things setup. & VP is a different animal from pinmame, there is a lot of things a lot of different people would like to see done with it.
I guess we'll see how it goes. But all in all, this really should be a great thing.
BIG THANKS to Randy for this, & destruk.

[Kristi]

Yes! This is fantastic news!

It will make the talk of picking up Emilia for Linux moot, as it would definitely be more beneficial to port VP to Linux/BSD/MacOSX than starting from scratch! Obviously non-Windows platforms will need native versions using something other than VB and DirectX - but I'm sure the code folks will figure it out. Wish I could help, but I'm not much of a programmer.

[Krellan]

Wow, this is good news indeed!

This will obviously be a very good thing for the community. Now, some of the most annoying bugs can be fixed. Of all the times for me to start a new full-time job! That leaves no time for a Linux port....

[lio]

i didn't have a chance to read through the entire thread yet to find out what is already happening but the news of vp going open source sure is great!
i certainly wouldn't have expected to see this happen! thanks randy for making that move! so cool also thanks to everyone who already has or will contribute to vp in one way or another!
can't wait to see what cool stuff this will bring to the table!

[Greywolf]

I have one serious request (well, among many) for anyone picking this up and working on it:

Break out the spinner_spin() routine to possibly spinner_spin() and spinner_unspin() or something like that, so that it can simulate the make/break of a real spinner. Those of you using the ROM-based games won't care. Those people designing EMs will.

[Joe]

add a ball in hand test / debug mode.

[destruk]

add a ball in hand test / debug mode.

It already has that Joe. Press escape, click debugger, then you can click stuff on the table to run the script routines.